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My point is that a very popular critique of the Palestinian statehood movement is that they have never managed to generate a great man of peace and wisdom such as King, Mandela, or Gandhi. This is then used as a pivot to explain why Israel is perfectly justified in any action whatsoever against the "barbarian Arabs" or whatnot.

I don't think it a moral failing to not be King, Mandela or Gandhi*, but I think it pretty clear the Palestinians would be MUCH better off if there had been such a leader, such a great man and they had gone down the path of non-violence versus where they are today.

I agree, and arguably it's a solid evidence in favor of the idea that they need a man (or woman) to make history. The circumstances have been ideal for a Mandela-like leader to emerge, but none have so far.

I don't think it a moral failing to not be King, Mandela or Gandhi*, but I think it pretty clear the Palestinians would be MUCH better off if there had been such a leader, such a great man and they had gone down the path of non-violence versus where they are today.

The degree of difficulty is raised when the Israeli government adopts a policy of targeted assassination of moderate Palestinian leaders and funds more fundamentalist, violence-prone organizations like Hamas, precisely to prevent any such leader from emerging.

The degree of difficulty is raised when the Israeli government adopts a policy of targeted assassination of moderate Palestinian leaders and funds more fundamentalist, violence-prone organizations like Hamas, precisely to prevent any such leader from emerging.

For the 500 years or so of a so-called "all comers" philosophy on accommodations, we had segregation, "No Jews and Dogs allowed," and a bunch of "we don't like your kind here" in general as fairly common policy.

I thought we were discussing English common law and England. Yes, those rules were changed in the US, but in practice rather than in law. Even Plessy v. Ferguson is consistent with the common law rule -- common carriers were required to take black passengers and had to offer them equal service, even if separate.

Those signs you mention weren't statements of law, they were ignoring the law. Which is what much of Jim Crow consisted.

The degree of difficulty is raised when the Israeli government adopts a policy of targeted assassination of moderate Palestinian leaders and funds more fundamentalist, violence-prone organizations like Hamas, precisely to prevent any such leader from emerging.

There's also the problem that "new" Palestinian leaders almost always seem to arise when established leaders are deemed too moderate/willing to compromise with the Israelis and teh new guys always seem to try to outflank the older leaders by being more aggressive/intransigent- for instance Hamas bled off support from Fatah by being even more anti-Israel

I did send a note to Jim yesterday, privately, calling his attention to the attempted Google-bomb of my name. That was the full extent of my "running to Jim." Jim's response and clarifications of the how his Terms of Service will be applied in situations such as that exchange, were fully his own (which is obvious, I'd think.) I would advise people to take note and keep that in mind going forward. It's Jim's house. It's Jim's rules.

BBTF is indeed Jim's playground and he can enforce, or not enforce, the rules as capriciously and arbitrarily as he likes. Just as you're free to exploit your relationship with Jim to attempt to protect yourself from the consequences of your bad behavior. It's all part of the game, but that doesn't mean certain actions can't be... illuminating.

To the point above, there's clearly a distinction between the snark and barb-throwing between regulars here (on all sorts of issues, not merely in the OTP threads) and yesterday's attempt to slur my full name via Google-bombing. But it's not my opinion that that is the case that matters. It's Jim's opinion that it was out of line that matters. It's Jim's house. It's Jim's rules.

You slurred yourself. Your subsequent unwillingness to own what you say isn't really relevant. Jim may run cover for you here, but it won't change what you said.

There's also the problem that "new" Palestinian leaders almost always seem to arise when established leaders are deemed too moderate/willing to compromise with the Israelis and teh new guys always seem to try to outflank the older leaders by being more aggressive/intransigent- for instance Hamas bled off support from Fatah by being even more anti-Israel

It is in both Israel and Hamas's best interests to keep the Palestinian leadership as "radical" as possible.

You slurred yourself. Your subsequent unwillingness to own what you say isn't really relevant.

I did no such thing. Nothing I've said in this thread or any other is even vaguely antisemitic, and your accusation was clearly slanderous. Pretty much everyone but Kehoskie agrees with that, I suspect.

The requirement for a person owning a public accomodation to provide service to all comers is a doctrine with deep roots in English Common Law. It most certainly is part of our legal tradition. The exception made to permit (or mandate) the service of blacks was a modification of that common law.

Yes, at common law common carriers were expected to serve all customers indiscriminately -- but the definition and scope of "public accommodation" was far narrower in that tradition than public accommodation laws today -- and certainly did not apply to employment.

Jim Crow consisted of multiple, reinforcing layers. There were state laws requiring segregation, of course. There were also private decisions to refuse service to blacks; a great deal of segregation consisted of this, famously the Woolworth's lunch counters. Then there was private violence which the state refused to prosecute (and which juries refused to convict). A good example of this last would be the Freedom Riders -- it was illegal to segregate interstate buses, but those who tried to integrate them risked their lives.

The problem libertarians have with Jim Crow is that they claim (nowadays, anyway) only to oppose the state laws. That was, frankly, a far less important problem than the societal decision to reject blacks. What broke that societal decision was the power of the federal government. And libertarians opposed that power in 1964 and still do today.

We also opposed the refusal to prosecute the private violence. (While it's true that juries refused to convict, it's also true that neither the prosecutors nor judges were actually trying to get them to convict. Federal prosecutions managed to secure convictions.)

Racism: Apparently just fine as long as the government doesn't mandate it!

For some reason, liberals always confuse legality with morality (while at the same time rebuffing conservatives' preferred laws on the grounds that you can't legislate morality.) The fact that libertarians oppose a law banning X does not mean that they think that X is "fine" or "okay." Most libertarians, like most non-libertarians, do not think racism is "just fine." (Rand denounced racism as just another form of collectivism.) But the fact that something is undesirable is not sufficient justification for banning it. (Similarly, the fact that something is desirable is not sufficient justification for mandating it.)

That's a good layout of the logic and chronology of the civil rights movement, and I'm not disputing any of it. And of course without the existence of a sense of contradiction between American ideals and American practice, a tension that after World War II began to emerge almost exclusively in the North, the civil rights movement never would have been able to succeed. To that extent, there was a difference "in kind" between the North and the South.

My point was that in the day-to-day life of African Americans in the North, at least before the mid-1950's, that difference "in kind" wasn't always that easy to discern. Let's take 1950 as a starting point, and try to note some of those differences along with some of the similarities.

In the North, residential segregation was even more ironclad than in the South. Those thousands of "Sundown Towns" were but the most extreme example of a much broader practice, codified in restrictive racial clauses in every housing contract.**

One major difference between the South and the border states WRT to "the Negro" was that in the border states he was less likely to be lynched. But by 1950 lynching was a rare occurrence even in the worst parts of the South.

The right to vote was secure in the North, almost nonexistent in the Deep South, and divided along urban-rural lines in the Upper South (North Carolina and Virginia) and the border states. Before the 1965 voting rights law was passed, there were parts of eastern North Carolina and rural Virginia that were nearly as bad as Alabama or Mississippi when it came to enforcement of the right to vote for blacks.

Schools were legally segregated from Maryland and Delaware and all points south, and de facto segregated in nearly all of the North, with isolated exceptions here and there that mostly were in "transitional" neighborhoods.

Public accommodations (restaurants, hotels, etc.) were 100% segregated from Maryland / Delaware on down, and while they were integrated by law in much of the North, there were plenty of places where service was denied to blacks without any legal repercussions. This sort of illegal restrictiveness was also applied to Jews even in places like New York City before it was finally stopped for good during the late 40's and early 1950's.

Discriminatory hiring was nearly universal in the North outside of CIO-controlled union shops*** (the AFL was largely made up of white-only craft unions), and discriminatory promotions were simply taken as a given, with virtually no exceptions. You could tell how rare these exceptions were by the fact that EBONY magazine would run feature stories of the occasional black person who got promoted to some deputy assistant managerial post in this or that branch of a large chain operation, one token among hundreds or thousands of whites.

All-white police forces were the rule rather than the exception throughout both the North and the South, with but a few token black policemen assigned even to black neighborhoods like Harlem. The thought of assigning a black man to patrol a white neighborhood would have been considered unthinkable anywhere in the country up until very late in the game.

And in terms of government hiring in general, there was almost no difference at all between North and South. In both cases, blacks were hired almost exclusively in two limited areas: Janitorial positions; and as teachers and deputy administrators in all-black schools, controlled by their white bosses. In the North you'd get a scattering of black social workers who were restricted solely to black "clients", but other than that there was almost no discernible difference between North and South.

Put all the above together, and that's the point I was making. It doesn't contradict anything you wrote in #698, but rather it should be seen as more of a complement, a kind of addendum to the points about the civil rights movement that we totally agree on.

**Those clauses were ruled unconstitutional by the Supreme Court in 1948, but that ruling had little effect in practice. It was only after those government guns began to back up that ruling in the 1968 fair housing laws that we began to see a bit of a breakup of the formerly all-white neighborhood patterns in the North.

***Those HORRIBLE union shops that made nondiscriminatory hiring a part of their contract negotiations, thereby robbing the company owner of his bedrock "freedom of choice" to discriminate.

How would we ever survive here without 'robinred' popping in to play his role as the self-appointed adult in the room?

That seems uncalled for, as robinred actually is an adult in the room. You don't see him engaging in these back-and-forths.

As to the larger point, the left-wing BBTF cheering section does routinely engage in these round-robin (no pun intended) attack-rests where they debate which conservative or libertarian around here they hate more. (With certain libertarians getting the dreaded label of "reasonable.") Sam is an outlier only in that he never contributes anything substantive besides the attacks. I'm not sure what the specific personal attack on him was on the previous page, and whether it crossed some sort of TOS line, but the best strategy is simply never to take anything Sam says seriously, like all of his RL acquaintances don't.

Wouldn't maximization of liberty be a fundamentally utilitarian philosophy?

One would necessarily argue that liberty is the highest happiness, or good, then work on ways to maximize that greatest good for the greatest number. Libertarians, then, shouldn't be arguing that their primary interest is in maximizing liberty (and I don't know that they do so argue).

I think it's silly when libertarians or their opponents pretend that the smallest degree of liberty trumps every other concern. Nobody is "only" a libertarian.

Part of the problem with having a discussion is a lack of agreement on terms; some people refer to "economic liberty" or "social liberty," concepts which libertarians tend to reject as overbroad. If you force me to put my political philosophy into a sound bite, it would be "leave each person alone to do what he or she chooses, so long as he or she is not violating the autonomy of another's body, mind, or property; hold people accountable for their actions that do violate the autonomy of others." That's what I want to maximize in a utilitarian sense, and the paradox is that we need a society that at times directly violates that principle in order to maximize its application.

While I could make a moral argument in favor of this approach, I don't see that as particularly useful, because many of us have a different moral code. Instead, I frame it as a pragmatic argument: people are going to disagree over what is right, so we can minimize conflict by allowing each individual to behave according to a personal moral code within his or her individual domain. Similarly, I would argue that some wealth redistribution is necessary in a pragmatic sense: a large underclass that is denied basic human rights creates a risk of rebellion and the destruction of society.

People don't try to overthrow the government because they aren't allowed to enter restaurants in a particular town. They do try to overthrow the government if they are starving.

The degree of difficulty is raised when the Israeli government adopts a policy of targeted assassination of moderate Palestinian leaders and funds more fundamentalist, violence-prone organizations like Hamas, precisely to prevent any such leader from emerging.

That's a pretty serious accusation. I'm interested in reading some citations supporting this if you can provide them.

also, that's a great use of weasel language ("i can't recall..."), since i'm pretty sure that you are familiar with the fact that strom thurmond was a right winger who did hold up plessy v. ferguson as an example of great jurisprudence.

Strom Thurmond? He's been dead for almost a decade, and he was little more than a GOP mascot for a decade or so before he died.

And if he did hold up Plessy for admiration, it was, what, at least 50 years ago?

People don't try to overthrow the government because they aren't allowed to enter restaurants in a particular town.

You appear to think that the various elements of Jim Crow are somehow separable: can't go into the diner: tolerable; separate drinking fountains: not my problem; lynching: bad and needs to be stamped out.

Not allowing blacks into the restaurant and lynching are two sides of the same coin, part of the same culture, a product of the same attitudes. One brings the other in its wake. If you tolerate one you are implicitly tolerating the other.

We also opposed the refusal to prosecute the private violence. (While it's true that juries refused to convict, it's also true that neither the prosecutors nor judges were actually trying to get them to convict. Federal prosecutions managed to secure convictions.)

Most libertarians opposed federal prosecutions on federalism grounds. The fact that they "opposed" the refusal by state authorities to prosecute private violence was meaningless.

My point was that in the day-to-day life of African Americans in the North, at least before the mid-1950's, that difference "in kind" wasn't always that easy to discern. Let's take 1950 as a starting point, and try to note some of those differences along with some of the similarities.

Andy,

I think we agree very much. In fact I would argue that the more open southern oppression and fight againsgt it really helped surface all the northern oppression in everyone's minds and without that foil work against what was happening in the north would have been much harder and a longer fight. Through the fight against Jim Crow was the entire rotten ediface exposed to the the light.

Right. Saying that an American values Israel's goals over those of the U.S. isn't an accusation of dual loyalty. Sure, Sam.

Wouldn't an American politician who 'values Israel's goals over those of the U.S.' and who acts on that value in his behavior and votes as a politician be guilty of treasonous behavior?

Metaphorically, or literally? As to the latter, treason is defined in the constitution, and that wouldn't remotely qualify, no. As to the former, unless it actually harmed the U.S., I wouldn't think so either, no. But it would be disloyal.

Most libertarians opposed federal prosecutions on federalism grounds. The fact that they "opposed" the refusal by state authorities to prosecute private violence was meaningless.

Which libertarians are you talking about exactly, here? Do you have someone specific in mind?

(And it would obviously depend what they were being prosecuted for, as to whether it would fit within the bounds of federalism. But certainly prosecutions of state actors for violating the civil rights of individuals would have been justified.)

The degree of difficulty is raised when the Israeli government adopts a policy of targeted assassination of moderate Palestinian leaders and funds more fundamentalist, violence-prone organizations like Hamas, precisely to prevent any such leader from emerging.

That's a pretty serious accusation. I'm interested in reading some citations supporting this if you can provide them.

yes it's my understanding that the targeted assassinations are aimed at, well the more violent fellows, and in recent years have been aimed at Hamas and some other groups- but not Fatah

As to the larger point, the left-wing BBTF cheering section does routinely engage in these round-robin (no pun intended) attack-rests where they debate which conservative or libertarian around here they hate more. (With certain libertarians getting the dreaded label of "reasonable.") Sam is an outlier only in that he never contributes anything substantive besides the attacks. I'm not sure what the specific personal attack on him was on the previous page, and whether it crossed some sort of TOS line, but the best strategy is simply never to take anything Sam says seriously, like all of his RL acquaintances don't.

I wouldn't say routinely, but I would say that it happens too often.

Sometimes comments about Joe or Ray (generally those two, but sometimes other people), cross what I would consider to be a line. It's sort of tricky because they both post with their real name (or have done so in the past), so people generally refer to them as such (which makes the situation somewhat different).

When I've noted this in the past, I've tried to say something about it, but it really doesn't do that much. This is something that actually bothers me, because I'm not really sure what to do about it. Speaking up about it doesn't seem to do much. I don't think that asking Jim to police the site more heavily is really an option either. Not that I'm advocating it, but this is the advantage of threaded comments, where you can downrank bad comments and eventually hide them from view.

Those signs you mention weren't statements of law, they were ignoring the law.

Is there an actual statute or some case law that demonstrates this position (prior to the passage of the Civil Rights Act)? If this were the established law of the land, then why was Title XII even necessary? Are you suggesting that it changed nothing about the legal status of a shopkeeper's right to discriminate as it had existed over the prior 450 years or so?

I think we agree very much. In fact I would argue that the more open southern oppression and fight againsgt it really helped surface all the northern oppression in everyone's minds and without that foil work against what was happening in the north would have been much harder and a longer fight. Through the fight against Jim Crow was the entire rotten ediface exposed to the the light.

Totally agree. It wasn't for nothing that it was often said that Bull Connor and his Birmingham Police Department were the best friends that the civil rights movement ever had.

But the fact that something is undesirable is not sufficient justification for banning it.

Like theft, for example?

Absolutely. The fact that theft is undesirable is not sufficient justification for banning it. The fact that a modern society cannot exist without a healthy respect for property rights, however, lends additional justification that passes the threshold.

Not allowing blacks into the restaurant and lynching are two sides of the same coin, part of the same culture, a product of the same attitudes. One brings the other in its wake. If you tolerate one you are implicitly tolerating the other.

I don't accept that at all. Kicking you out of my restaurant because I don't like the color of your skin doesn't violate your bodily autonomy, and lynching most certainly does. It is a substantial difference in kind, not merely degree.

No. Your body is you. You don't own yourself. You are not distinct from your body. It's a senseless statement you make here.

You may not own yourself. I own myself.

Would it help if I phrased it as "Every man has a Property in his own Person"? (What I love about Sam's pretense at being an intellectual is that he shows no understanding of the fact that these ideas did not originate with me. It's one thing to attempt to mount a logical challenge to them; it's another to dismiss them with a handwave without grasping their pedigree, as though they sprung half-formed from Ron Paul's tongue.)

When I've noted this in the past, I've tried to say something about it, but it really doesn't do that much. This is something that actually bothers me, because I'm not really sure what to do about it. Speaking up about it doesn't seem to do much. I don't think that asking Jim to police the site more heavily is really an option either. Not that I'm advocating it, but this is the advantage of threaded comments, where you can downrank bad comments and eventually hide them from view.

I've discovered that putting one rather prolific poster on ignore actually tremendously improve my experience with this site, though I still sometimes see this guy's nonsense because others see fit to copy and paste it- but that's ok- they generally do that to call out his BS which usually obviates my urge to do likewise.

The targeting of Hamas is designed to weaken its legitimacy in favor of even more radical and violent groups.

Again, this is a pretty strong accusation. When you go so far as to say "is designed to," there's a bit higher standard of proof. I'd like to see some evidence that this is indeed the motivation of the Israeli government before I'm going to accept this as true.

Property is about owning and possessing something outside yourself. To have effect in organized social life, it has to be a legal concept, and legal concepts are artificial creations within a societal context, which of course libertarians deny, and which is why I see them as having a creationist mindset. It makes no ultimate sense and serves no purpose (although it can serve as comparative clarification) to refer to your person as your property, except in a strictly ideologically dogmatic pseudo-religious sense. They can then state their biases as axioms that don't have to be intellectually defended or even explained. Libertarianism is to political philosophy what Intelligent Design is to biology. It allows one to make many gross assumptions without deigning to attempt to prove anything.

That's right: axioms are not provable. Congratulations on learning intro to logic. (Or at least looking up the word "axiom" in the dictionary.)

But it does violate the contract you have with society and the person you are kicking out since he is part of society and helping to subsidize your establishment.

What about the person who wants access to my physical body? He's helping to subsidize my safety; why shouldn't he have access if he wants it? Why isn't that violating the contract? Your position allows any sort of violation of autonomy, since autonomy is "subsidized" by society.

I don't think it a moral failing to not be King, Mandela or Gandhi*, but I think it pretty clear the Palestinians would be MUCH better off if there had been such a leader, such a great man and they had gone down the path of non-violence versus where they are today.

This is rather misleading. The problem with the Palestinians is not that they took up arms rather than engaged in non-violent civil disobedience. (Of what, exactly?) The problem with the Palestinians is that they took up arms to blow up airplanes and pizzerias and buses and shoot up schools and Olympic athletes and airports. Oh, and the minor point that their goal wasn't civil rights, but Jew-killing.

The degree of difficulty is raised when the Israeli government adopts a policy of targeted assassination of moderate Palestinian leaders and funds more fundamentalist, violence-prone organizations like Hamas, precisely to prevent any such leader from emerging.

I also hate the way they kill all the Palestinian unicorns and steal the Palestinian leprechauns' gold, as long as you're living in a fantasy world.

I've discovered that putting one rather prolific poster on ignore actually tremendously improve my experience with this site, though I still sometimes see this guy's nonsense because others see fit to copy and paste it- but that's ok- they generally do that to call out his BS which usually obviates my urge to do likewise.

Part of the problem with having a discussion is a lack of agreement on terms; some people refer to "economic liberty" or "social liberty," concepts which libertarians tend to reject as overbroad. If you force me to put my political philosophy into a sound bite, it would be "leave each person alone to do what he or she chooses, so long as he or she is not violating the autonomy of another's body, mind, or property; hold people accountable for their actions that do violate the autonomy of others." That's what I want to maximize in a utilitarian sense, and the paradox is that we need a society that at times directly violates that principle in order to maximize its application.

A major failing of this sort of philosophy (in my mind) is the refusal to acknolwedge externalities. Pollution is the obvious one (factory owner pollutes and does not bear the cost of this pollution and so has no incentive to modify their behavior as economic theory dictates they should. I think there are also externalities around basic rights that go way past what your formulation acknowledges.

Having places of business being allowed to discriminate who they serve costs everyone in society, and the cost to the owner of the business is less than that born by society (similar to the pollution example). If a business discriminates against 10% of the population their opportunity cost is 10% of their business (minus those of the 90% offended + those of the 90% who prefer things that way). The cost to society in all its forms is much higher.

* Business are overall less efficient at delivering whatever the business does (the business in question is almost certainly the best choice of some of the discriminated against).

* Any business which needs a certain population density to be profitable such that the discrimnated against in total numbers don't meet that density then they will be shut out of that service. In other words if a town can only support one of business X and that business discrimnates then not only are the discrimnated against paying the penalty, but the area is deprived of any value generated. Basically it is better if resources (such as those offered by businesses) are well allocated, it leads to more productivity, more tax revenues and so on. By allowing resources to be poorly allocated all of society pays the price.

* By excluding the discrimnated from some public spaces it reinforces that it is OK to have discrimination - society is givng its OK to discrimnate. Behavior which encourages separation, encourages anything which can lead to stress in a society (which discrimnation clearly does) imposes a cost on that soceity, one not fully born by the businesses in question.

An example of this concept(not perfect, but I hope illustrative), to bring it around to baseball, is pre-integration baseball. Because of social externalities society as a whole was hurt far more in aggregate than baseball ownership could possibly have gained individually from banning blacks (assuming they gained anything at all). The quality of baseball was harmed, society was deprived of higher quality baseball, but baseball ownership did not bear the full cost of those decisions and because of the circumstances (and their actions) avoided much of it.

In a perfect world segregated baseball could never have lasted as long as it did, but the world is not perfect. Eventually baseball got there before they were forced to by the government, but I think that saysd more about the failure of government and society than it does the success of Libertarian philosophy. In any event I think the external cost of what happened is clear and hopefully illustrates the costs I am speaking of.

People don't try to overthrow the government because they aren't allowed to enter restaurants in a particular town. They do try to overthrow the government if they are starving.

The genius of democracy is you can in fact overthrown your government over any darn thing you want, by voting. The barrier to revolution is lower than in other forms of government.

I've discovered that putting one rather prolific poster on ignore actually tremendously improve my experience with this site, though I still sometimes see this guy's nonsense because others see fit to copy and paste it- but that's ok- they generally do that to call out his BS which usually obviates my urge to do likewise.

I resisted this for many years, but finally gave in. My results were the same (although to be fair, I do have two names in my list).

You really have got to be kidding, seriously, you have got to be kidding.

No, not at all. It's clear which laws/policies that MLK (et al) wanted overturned when they engaged in civil disobedience. Which laws do you think Palestinians wanted overturned -- besides the no-killing Jews one?

I resisted this for many years, but finally gave in. My results were the same (although to be fair, I do have two names in my list).

I'm curious as to who gets put on ignore the most, I assume Jim knows or has way of knowing- maybe he could start a thread showing who is on ignore at any given time and how many have them on ignore...

Though I suppose if he did, some might see it as a contest as to who can be the most offensive.

They're no longer allowed here, but I suppose that Kevin and Rob Base were on a lot of people's ignore lists...

OTOH the guy I have on ignore isn't remotely close to merit being banned, he's not verbally abusive or offensive, I just found his brand of stupidity to be really really grating to me after awhile.

No, not at all. It's clear which laws/policies that MLK (et al) wanted overturned when they engaged in civil disobedience. Which laws do you think Palestinians wanted overturned -- besides the no-killing Jews one?

Overplaying your hand again. We would all laugh if it were not so childish and pathetic.

Is there an actual statute or some case law that demonstrates this position (prior to the passage of the Civil Rights Act)? If this were the established law of the land, then why was Title XII even necessary? Are you suggesting that it changed nothing about the legal status of a shopkeeper's right to discriminate as it had existed over the prior 450 years or so?

No statutes, we're talking about a common law rule. That means there is no statute. The CRA did a couple of things: (1) As DMN noted above, it extended the common law rule to a variety of business that wouldn't have been covered by the c.l. rule (not all businesses were -- it mostly applied to common carriers and to innkeepers). (2) It eliminated the rule of Plessy that "separate but equal" satisfied the rule. In addition, it extended liability in some cases to private actors rather than state actors.

If you want a good book on the common law rule, I recommend Fairness And Justice by Haar and Fessler.

This is rather misleading. The problem with the Palestinians is not that they took up arms rather than engaged in non-violent civil disobedience. (Of what, exactly?) The problem with the Palestinians is that they took up arms to blow up airplanes and pizzerias and buses and shoot up schools and Olympic athletes and airports. Oh, and the minor point that their goal wasn't civil rights, but Jew-killing.

I think you are wrong. Non-violence is about achieving political aims through means other than violence. Just as there were blacks in the south that wanted to rise up and kill whitey, there are palistinians that want to kill jews full stop. These groups are not who I am talking about, obviously, and the fact you want to conflate them to make your argument easier does not make it so.

If the goal is peace in the middle east, then the best strategy is non-violence as a tool to enact political goals. Tehre are many reason for this. First of all for many things it is very effective, much moreso than violence. Second of all non-violence can really only be effectively utilized for moral objectives (for want of a better term), it flat does not work for genocide or other such things (for what I hope are obvious reasons).

So if you want to ascribe only immoral goals to palistinians then yeah I can see where you believe non-violence is not relevent to the discussion. That does not make it reality though.

Out of curiousity, what is your answer to the situation in the mideast? If non-violence is a non-starter and the palistinians in total are all about immoral goals (a very strong charge to ascribe that to everyone, or even a plurality) then what is the answer, unending violence? I content if that is the answer then you are asking the wrong question.

No. You do not. Ownership is an subject-object relationship. You are not an object to yourself. You are yourself. This is a flaw of your ontology.

Would it help if I phrased it as "Every man has a Property in his own Person"? (What I love about Sam's pretense at being an intellectual is that he shows no understanding of the fact that these ideas did not originate with me. It's one thing to attempt to mount a logical challenge to them; it's another to dismiss them with a handwave without grasping their pedigree, as though they sprung half-formed from Ron Paul's tongue.)

No, David, it would not help to quote the Second Treatise because, *gasp*, Locke is also wrong. Descartes? Wrong! You are your body. You don't own your body. Any proposition depending on the notion of this duality distinction is incorrect from the start.

They are looking for autonomy, self-government, and protection of their property -- all good libertarian values. Right now Palestinian land is being taken, by force, by Israeli settlers. Palestinian olive groves are being cut down. Palestinian homes are being bulldozed. They want those things to stop.

A major failing of this sort of philosophy (in my mind) is the refusal to acknolwedge externalities. Pollution is the obvious one (factory owner pollutes and does not bear the cost of this pollution and so has no incentive to modify their behavior as economic theory dictates they should. I think there are also externalities around basic rights that go way past what your formulation acknowledges.

Libertarians routinely acknowledge externalities such as pollution. Under CrosbyBird's formulation, that would fall under "violating the autonomy of another's body, mind, or property." The problem is that liberals define "externalities" much more broadly to encompass anything they a priori don't like. To wit:

Having places of business being allowed to discriminate who they serve costs everyone in society, and the cost to the owner of the business is less than that born by society (similar to the pollution example). If a business discriminates against 10% of the population their opportunity cost is 10% of their business (minus those of the 90% offended + those of the 90% who prefer things that way). The cost to society in all its forms is much higher.

* Business are overall less efficient at delivering whatever the business does (the business in question is almost certainly the best choice of some of the discriminated against).

That isn't a cost to this imaginary construct you call society, any more than choosing to be an art history major rather than an engineer is. That choice may result in a lower GDP, but so what? Nobody owes this "society" thing an efficient use of one's own resources.

* By excluding the discrimnated from some public spaces it reinforces that it is OK to have discrimination - society is givng its OK to discrimnate. Behavior which encourages separation, encourages anything which can lead to stress in a society (which discrimnation clearly does) imposes a cost on that soceity, one not fully born by the businesses in question.

You mean private spaces, not public spaces. No libertarian defends segregation in public spaces. But that some people will think bad thoughts is not a cognizable cost.

An example of this concept(not perfect, but I hope illustrative), to bring it around to baseball, is pre-integration baseball. Because of social externalities society as a whole was hurt far more in aggregate than baseball ownership could possibly have gained individually from banning blacks (assuming they gained anything at all). The quality of baseball was harmed, society was deprived of higher quality baseball, but baseball ownership did not bear the full cost of those decisions and because of the circumstances (and their actions) avoided much of it.

Who says that society [sic] was hurt? If 'society' preferred segregated baseball to 'higher quality baseball,' then 'society' benefitted from it. You're imposing your own valuations on others. (Baseball is an odd example, because the way you phrase it you make it sound as if segregationist owners were imposing segregated baseball on an unwilling public. There may have been some segregationist owners, to be sure, but MLB's color line was not based on their personal preferences.) And once fans decided that they did prefer higher quality baseball to segregated baseball, it ended.

No, not at all. It's clear which laws/policies that MLK (et al) wanted overturned when they engaged in civil disobedience. Which laws do you think Palestinians wanted overturned -- besides the no-killing Jews one?

How about not having to pass through an Israeli Army check point when going from one Palestinian village to another? Not having Israeli control your imports and exports?
Not having Israel unilaterally decide who can build what and where.

People whose ancestors lived in Israel 2000 years ago can freely immigrate, become citizens and vote, people whose ancestors lived in Israel 70 years ago cannot.

Jews in the West Bank and Gaza were Israeli citizens who could vote in Israel elections, non-Jews were not allowed to vote until the toothless and powerless Palestinian "Authority" was established.

The more extreme members of the settler movement have engaged in an ongoing campaign of harassment against Palestinians since the 1970s (burning down Olive Groves was a fave trick)- then running and hiding behind the IDF.

I know none of this bothers you, just as you are seemingly unbothered by Jim Crow in this Country- and by that I mean that you claim that Jim Crow conditions were wrong while simultaneously opposing every single thing tat would or could have alleviated those conditions.

The Nazis in Germany can fairly be branded as people who simply wanted to kill Jews, if the average Germany had any legitimate (grounded in reality) grievances against Jews or Jewish organizations I've never heard of one. The Palestinians OTOH have seen massive Jewish immigration, Israeli control of most aspects of Palestinian life, relegation to second class citizenship status, or simply non-status- of course their should be blame all around- against their won leaders, against Egypt and Jordan and their other Arab "brothers," but to facilely claim that the Palestinians have no cause at all is just completely ludicrous and "unserious"

David at his best is a thought-provoking, well informed person whom I'm rarely on the same page with (when it comes to politics. We're pretty close when it comes to baseball).

He and Ray were on my read list on usenet (as was Tom Nawrocki, Ben Hitz, Szym, sAM, Chris Dial. Those are just the names I recognize -- and I'm certain I'm missing some obvious names. I know there are other rsb alum here and I probably had all of them in my read list -- it wasn't a small list)

I think you are wrong. Non-violence is about achieving political aims through means other than violence. Just as there were blacks in the south that wanted to rise up and kill whitey, there are palistinians that want to kill jews full stop. These groups are not who I am talking about, obviously, and the fact you want to conflate them to make your argument easier does not make it so.

So if you want to ascribe only immoral goals to palistinians then yeah I can see where you believe non-violence is not relevent to the discussion. That does not make it reality though.

I think the problem with your post as a whole is that it seemingly starts the historical clock today. But the situation in question did not arise today, or even yesterday. It arose decades ago, and history is path dependent. We're not talking about "groups," as if we were still talking about the Branch Davidians; we're talking about what passed for Palestinian leadership, not to mention the larger Arab leadership. Which wanted to kill Jews full stop. That you can find individual Palestinians who were peace-loving doesn't help, because Israel wasn't confronted by them separately, and couldn't deal with them separately. (Note that the situation was very different within the green line, where Israel could, did, and does.) Now, if you're talking about what to do now, I don't actually believe that non-violence is not relevant to the discussion. But the issue is organized violence, not individual violence.

A major failing of this sort of philosophy (in my mind) is the refusal to acknolwedge externalities. Pollution is the obvious one (factory owner pollutes and does not bear the cost of this pollution and so has no incentive to modify their behavior as economic theory dictates they should. I think there are also externalities around basic rights that go way past what your formulation acknowledges.

I think you're reading not what I wrote, but your own characterization of what you think my position is. Externalities are accounted for by the "hold people accountable for the harm they do others" piece.

Having places of business being allowed to discriminate who they serve costs everyone in society, and the cost to the owner of the business is less than that born by society (similar to the pollution example).

You are shifting from "violates autonomy" to "cost." I acknowledge that there is a cost to society when some members are inconsiderate jerks, but the standard isn't "does something bad." The standard is "violates autonomy of body, mind, and private property" or "is necessary for society to function competitively in the global community."

Legalization of cocaine is almost certainly a net cost to society. Cocaine doesn't make us a more efficient economy, it doesn't improve individual health (generally speaking); it generally does not improve people other than creating temporary, artificial euphoria. Yet cocaine should be completely legal, because the government should not be imposing some standard of efficiency on its citizens. If you want to make the tradeoff of reduced productivity in exchange for euphoria, it is none of my business.

There's an enormous cost to society in the proliferation of anti-scientific nonsense. Yet government should not ban young-earth creationism or astrology.

The genius of democracy is you can in fact overthrow your government over any darn thing you want, by voting. The barrier to revolution is lower than in other forms of government.

Not really. You can, if you get enough people to agree with you, make small changes to the existing government. When I say overthrow the government, I mean end the current system of government and create a new one. That isn't part of the democracy, but the end of this democracy and the creation of another system.

That's right: axioms are not provable. Congratulations on learning intro to logic. (Or at least looking up the word "axiom" in the dictionary.)

Now, look up the thing about lamp posts and drunks, and think about why that applies to you and libertarians. Simply because you believe your view is based on axioms doesn't mean it is. That's the clown talk, bro. And time after time I've explained why your easy reversion and reliance on axiom as if it is your olly olly oxen free doesn't compute. You are wrong in taking your position as axiomatic. It isn't. There's evidence and reasoning to that evidence that demonstrates your standing on air.

Ray can be funny when he puts his mind to it, to me Dave's snark seems to misfire, but to each his own.

That's unpossible.

I should say that if you don't think I'm funny, fine -- my wife and daughter would agree -- but some people seem to have this image of me as being always serious, and I'm not. I don't say things that I don't believe for shock value, but I'm always half tongue-in-cheek when I'm writing.

Ray is amusing over drinks. David always chickens out. I think he's a'feard of me.

Actually, you keep scheduling your trips up here on Jewish holidays. Okay, yes, the fear too. (Plus, I'm not really a NYer, so I keep getting notified at the very last minute because the NY crowd here arranging the get togethers doesn't think of me until then.)

Not really. You can, if you get enough people to agree with you, make small changes to the existing government. When I say overthrow the government, I mean end the current system of government and create a new one. That isn't part of the democracy, but the end of this democracy and the creation of another system.

Within a democracy you can vote to end the current system of government and create a new one.

Yes, at common law common carriers were expected to serve all customers indiscriminately -- but the definition and scope of "public accommodation" was far narrower in that tradition than public accommodation laws today -- and certainly did not apply to employment.

Social and cultural institutions and the concepts they embody evolve over time. There was evolution to the get that point, and an evolution from that point to now. What we grant and utilize is up to us to decide. Nothing is set in a template that can't be changed.

No statutes, we're talking about a common law rule. That means there is no statute.

Not entirely. Common law comes from case law, which is guided in part by statute. It doesn't exist in a vacuum. That's why I asked for particular statutes or cases that demonstrated a merchant's obligation to serve all customers.

"Common carriers" is a term of art, not a broad category that encompasses every business in the public space. Verizon is a common carrier. Amtrak is a common carrier. John's General Store is most certainly not a common carrier.

The CRA did a couple of things: (1) As DMN noted above, it extended the common law rule to a variety of business that wouldn't have been covered by the c.l. rule (not all businesses were -- it mostly applied to common carriers and to innkeepers)

This is exactly what I was saying: prior to the CRA, there was no common law rule that businesses in general were obligated to take all comers based on their presence in the public sphere. There were special sorts of businesses that had special obligations, but the general presumption was that private owners could accept and refuse service based on personal whim.

The tradition was "owner's discretion"; universal acceptance was the exception.

2) It eliminated the rule of Plessy that "separate but equal" satisfied the rule. In addition, it extended liability in some cases to private actors rather than state actors.

Wasn't the real issue with Plessy that "separate but equal" really was, in practice, for "separate and not-really-close-to-equal"?

If you want a good book on the common law rule, I recommend Fairness And Justice by Haar and Fessler.

Would it help if I phrased it as "Every man has a Property in his own Person"? (What I love about Sam's pretense at being an intellectual is that he shows no understanding of the fact that these ideas did not originate with me. It's one thing to attempt to mount a logical challenge to them; it's another to dismiss them with a handwave without grasping their pedigree, as though they sprung half-formed from Ron Paul's tongue.)

For some reason, liberals always confuse legality with morality (while at the same time rebuffing conservatives' preferred laws on the grounds that you can't legislate morality.) The fact that libertarians oppose a law banning X does not mean that they think that X is "fine" or "okay." Most libertarians, like most non-libertarians, do not think racism is "just fine." (Rand denounced racism as just another form of collectivism.) But the fact that something is undesirable is not sufficient justification for banning it. (Similarly, the fact that something is desirable is not sufficient justification for mandating it.)

The problem with the Palestinians is not that they took up arms rather than engaged in non-violent civil disobedience. (Of what, exactly?) The problem with the Palestinians is that they took up arms to blow up airplanes and pizzerias and buses and shoot up schools and Olympic athletes and airports. Oh, and the minor point that their goal wasn't civil rights, but Jew-killing.

But they believe they are just in killing Jews because Jews are unrelenting when it comes to their rights. Are you saying that killing is where you draw the line on your Randian rights? Or is that only a stricture imposed on others when they come in conflict with you?

Not entirely. Common law comes from case law, which is guided in part by statute.

No, this is wrong. Common law does come from case law, but when people talk about rules at common law, they are excluding statutes.

"Common carriers" is a term of art, not a broad category that encompasses every business in the public space. Verizon is a common carrier. Amtrak is a common carrier. John's General Store is most certainly not a common carrier.

Correct.

This is exactly what I was saying: prior to the CRA, there was no common law rule that businesses in general were obligated to take all comers based on their presence in the public sphere.

If that's what you meant, I certainly didn't understand it. I responded to your suggestion that businesses in the US didn't follow the common law rule. Implicit in this is the assumption that those businesses were subject to the common law rule. If they weren't, then of course they weren't violating it. But the whole context of the discussion (which started with the Woolworth's lunch counters and Trailways buses) was common carriers.

The tradition was "owner's discretion"; universal acceptance was the exception.

It's much more complex than that.

Wasn't the real issue with Plessy that "separate but equal" really was, in practice, for "separate and not-really-close-to-equal"?

That was a problem with the implementation of Plessy, but not the theory. What the CRA and related Court decisions did was reject even the theory.

Locke believed in a top-down imposition of values and (heh heh) axioms. That's so yesterday. That's not how social values and precepts come about. They're not hanging out there in the universe from this cosmic tree just waiting for us to pluck them.

Locke believed in a top-down imposition of values and (heh heh) axioms. That's so yesterday. That's not how social values and precepts come about. They're not hanging out there in the universe from this cosmic tree just waiting for us to pluck them.

Well, yours certainly aren't.

(Of course, to switch the topic from rights to "social values" is just a bait-and-switch.)

I'm sure Good Face could come up with a theory as to why that is so. Can't help with the last minute/NYC thing. I may be back up in Princeton this month, if the go-live doesn't settle down and, well, go live. I will attempt to contract a messenger service to carriage you a missive to the Gulch.

hell I'm afraid of you too.

I'm so happy that I'm not the regular you've got blocked! I wish there was a feature to see who had me blocked, so I could insult them in the quiet spaces in between.

(Of course, to switch the topic from rights to "social values" is just a bait-and-switch.)

If you read, you'd know I've said time and time again that there rights exist only a context. In the biological contest you have the right to eat, try to keep from being eaten, copulate, and excrete. When our biology gave rise to rudimentary social relationshps (permanent mating, friendships, alliances, etc.), the rights became richer and more complicated in our inter-relationship. You better quit running in place. Because as that noted evolutionist, Satchel Paige, has warned you, something just may be catching up to you.

Gunfire erupted on Thursday at a California high school in inland Kern County, a sheriff's department dispatcher said, and media reports indicated two people had been shot and the assailant arrested.

The dispatcher confirmed the shooting at Taft Union High School but gave no other details.

A California ABC affiliate reported that sheriff's deputies were going room-by-room to secure the school and that two people had been shot, but had no immediate word on their condition. It said the shooter had been apprehended by police.

The station, 23ABC News, reported that some people had called the station from inside the school, where they were hiding in closets.

I considered that, but decided discretion was the better part of valor in not saying it.

Can't help with the last minute/NYC thing. I may be back up in Princeton this month, if the go-live doesn't settle down and, well, go live. I will attempt to contract a messenger service to carriage you a missive to the Gulch.

See, Princeton. Now you're talking my neck of the woods/my side of the river.

I can see it. Though I am afraid of geese, mannequins, and scissors so I guess that's not saying much.

There is nothing scarier than being at a 2 year old's birthday party, and while you are trying to extricate a new toy from its packaging having said 2 year old run off and run back straight at you with pointy scissors in hand.